Same for me. I feel bad for leaving food or something. They always told me to imagine those starving kids in Africa and then there i was refusing to eat. I could never relate as a child with the african kids because I WAS NEVER ALLOWED to feel hungry, but the opposite, the sensation to be about to explode, that is something i knew well and hated.

Same here, any time I wasted food it was “there are starving people out there who would kill for that”, but at the same time I would get criticism for wearing clothes that didn’t “flatter my figure”. Safe to say I don’t have a great relationship with both food and my body.

Yupp, this was my dad! My dad is really terrible at expressing himself so one of the only ways he knew how to do that was through his food. My parents were divorced and I visited him every Sunday, and what he cooked for dinner was always a huge deal for him. He would ask if I was a "clean plater" and if I didn't eat every last bite, he would act offended by it and question me non-stop why I didn't like it, etc.

I'm 25 and I didn't realize until within the last year the effect it had on me. I regularly overeat and feel like I have to finish all of my food or it makes me feel bad or wasteful. My SO has noticed and even told me that it's unusual for me to not finish my plate. I frequently have to remind myself that my body is not a garbage disposal and it's okay to stop eating before the plate is spotless.

Same. My mom made us feel guilty like we were insulting her cooking if we didn’t have seconds. I ended up over 200 lbs in high school because of it. Once I started cooking for myself I lost over 50 lbs

Yup same for me. All the food must be gone off the plate. It took me a long time to grow out of that habit. Now that I’m an adult i can do what I want. I only take out how much I need and just eat that. When I was younger my mom took out food for me or she’d pressure me into eating more.

Same here. Always got the “starving kids in Africa” card. I finally just learned a little while ago that “full” doesn’t mean “oh my god I can’t eat anymore”. Now I’m happily losing weight!! Still struggling a little bit with it but I’m a lot better than I was.

Honest question- why not just eat what you feel like and then put the rest in some plastic wrap or Tupperware for later? That way you aren't wasting anything. It helped me a lot- not h
I have a ton of half eaten meals and snacks in my fridge/pantry.

starting from 2nd grade, my mom weighed me every single morning before school, and most of the time after school as well. if my weight wasn't to her expectation, my lunch would change. she kept it written down on a chart visible to everyone in the family.

there's a lot more, but that's probably the biggest one. i learned from the age of 6 to be very ashamed of my fat, ugly body. it was on me, the 6 year old, to somehow know proper nutrition, despite the fact that my morbidly obese mother did not teach me anything.

I hate this so much. I’m so sorry. It’s insane that young kids who are really just naturally chubby have to go through such a huge amount of guilt and confidence issues due to something they really know nothing about. Fellow fatty here, I hope you’ve been able to find someone to talk to about this? <3

My dad always encouraged us to eat more. "Did you clean your plate? Oh, ok, go get another helping ... or here take what's left on my plate". And would hound continuously until I did so - and if his constant hounding didn't work, he'd just come scoop more food onto my plate anyway. As my sister and I predictably started to gain weight, he'd also make comments about how we had thunder thighs and boys weren't going to like us - all while still doing the "eat more" routine at dinner.

this. it's frightening when you realize how many tactics of abusive parents are for the express purpose of destroying their kids' development so that they fail to launch and stay at home forever. and enjoy the benefits whilst simultaneously complaining to all in earshot about their lazy NEET.

That's a great point. He came up for dinner one time and as we were walking into the restaurant I was holding hands with my SO ... and my dad tried to put his arm around my shoulder and pull me towards him instead. It was .... weird.

god thats horrible, I am so sorry to hear that. I wonder how parents can be so cruel to their own children. We had the clear plate rule too but everyone would start out with an empty plate and bowls of food in the middle, and then you were advised to take only as much as you knew you would eat so everyone would take like 1 potato one spoon full of salad and a bit of meat and then again when they finished it until you were full. if I took too much and did not finish I got scolded, but thats it.

In my senior year of high school, I got very sick. I couldn't keep anything down and I was literally starting to starve. The only thing I could seem to eat and not immediately throw up was snack food. My parents refused to take me to see a doc as they were heavily into alternative medicine at the time. Instead they took me to see a chiropractor who "diagnosed" me as having a stalled digestion and gave me meds that would "speed up" my digestion. He also recommended I take a shot of olive oil before every meal. As if my digestive system was a slip and slide that needed more water. These, of course, made the problem worse. I started throwing up several times a day, regardless of how much I ate. Eventually, I just stopped trying to eat much because everything hurt. Due to starving myself, I started to lose significant amounts of weight and started getting compliments on how "good" I looked while thin. I went from a healthy cheerleader that ate like a horse and worked out for an hour a day and was a bit pudgy, to a skeleton that ate maybe 800 calories a day. And the skeleton was better to most people.

I complained to my friend (who is now my husband) that I was constantly tired and was losing the ability to breath while lying down. He immediately dragged me to an actual doctor and I get diagnosed with GERD (basically the top of my stomach doesn't close). So anything that was hard to digest, like healthy vegetables and meat, would be forced back out of my stomach by the digestion process. The meds that "speed up" my digestion just made it worse and the oil was obviously rejected.

What REALLY sucks is that GERD is super treatable with some daily anacids (I take over the counter protein pump inhibitors which lowers the strength of my stomach acid) and a change in my eating schedule (I eat 4-5 handful sized meals a day to prevent stomach stretching). I was lucky that I never needed my esophagus removed (a common issue with untreated GERD) and I have a heightened risk of cancer of the esophagus. I've lost most of my teeth to the stomach acid and I fear food to this day.

I started to lose significant amounts of weight and started getting compliments on how "good" I looked while thin

This shit right there. People still to this day will tell me not to worry, and that I look good a lil pudgy (135 lbs 5'5"). But wait til I go on insane fast or have a depressive episode and shed weight super fast - "you look amazing" from literally everyone.

I work in retail, I have regular customers that I usually see a few times a month. Every once in awhile if someone hasn't seen me for a bit I get 'OMG have you lost weight?! That's awesome, you look great!"

I mean, I appreciate the compliment but I don't feel comfortable telling everyone that the weight loss is because I am sick, and I feel awful. I usually just say "a little" and thank them.

But really, I'm only 5'5 and about 125 lb, why are you congratulating me for losing weight? Do I really look that much better with a thigh gap? I'm finally at a point in my life where I don't obsess about my weight or being thin and now other people are doing it for me.

I've defiantly tried to be more aware of this. If its someone I know and I know they're trying to lose weight, I;ll say "you look healthy! how are you feeling?" because it acknowledges their efforts but doesn't put as much of an emphasis on their size

Right! I want to complement people but I'm always worried I'm crossing some line or making them uncomfortable. Now I just comment on their mood or clothing, unless I know they've been going to the gym or something.

I am also an ex cheerleader that couldn't stop throwing up. After years of fighting for answers, I now know I have gastroparesis... which fits your description perfectly. I'm not doubting you have GERD. I'm suggesting there might be more to it.

Gastroparesis is a condition where the stomach walls don't contract properly, so food doesn't get mashed up and pushed through to the small intestine.

I like to describe the condition this way: imagine a 3 story house that has a clogged sink on the 3rd floor, nothing's wrong with the house's pluming, that sink just drains slower than it should. Now imagine the sink getting pissed off that it's draining slow, so it expels the clog out of the sink like it's a threat.

Does your stomach "growl' on a regular basis? If not, I suggest seeing a gastric motility specialist and ask for a stomach emptying test.

Going a bit deeper since you dropped the cheerleader hint, are you really flexible? If yes, you might have a connective tissue disorder like me. Let me know if you'd like to hear more

Good, I'm glad you're not super flexible like me. It's super rare for young, healthy, non-diabetic, females to aquire gastropaersis, which is why it took me so long to get diagnosed. Basically it's never considered until your elderly or have diabetes. But having a connective tissue disorder increases the likelihood of vagal nerve damage, thereby paralyzing the stomach walls, which is why I asked. Good luck! I'm here if you think of any questions

OMG I experienced the same thing. It got to the point where I wasn't allowed to go to the bathroom within 1.5hrs of finishing a meal because my parents were convinced I was forcing myself to throw up. The day I started those antacids I started immediately feeling better.

Stomach acid is no joke! Nothing is more painful to throw up. So sorry to hear about your teeth :(

Pales in comparison but my parents ended up having to re-carpet most of the house as my throwing up stomach acid had destroyed large portions of the carpet. I never had time to make it to the bathroom as it always happened so suddenly.

When I was little, all my family gave me their tomatoes because they didn't like them but I did. Then one day when I was 5 or less, my grandma was eating a salad and tried to cut a cherry tomato instead of just stabbing it, and it squirted into my eye. I stopped eating them pretty much immediately. Tomato products are fine (ketchup, salsa, etc) but raw slices or anything are right out.

I'm so intrigued by the different approaches parents can have and the affect it can have.

My mom threw out food. Often. She loved to experiment and try new things and sometimes they were just awful, lol. She'd say we didn't have to eat it just because she'd made it and we should only eat it if we like it. I'm always trying new things in the kitchen. Yes, I don't like to just throw out food, but I'm not choking down something that tastes horrible.

I wasn't allowed to eat what my brothers ate because they're boys and boys can "eat more because they don't have to worry about gaining weight". This included no birthday cake, even on my own birthday, where they would give my share to my brothers. One year my grandma made me my own mini cake and hid it so I could have some too.

My grandma would buy desserts just to make a point of throwing them away in front of me unopened because I was "too fat for dessert". My mom was counting my calories by 7.

I count calories religiously for health reasons now and always will because I love it, and I feel like I'm getting a hold on my food addiction.

Not so bad, but my parents blamed sugar for literally everything. If I was upset it was because I had too much sugar, if I was angry it was because I had too much sugar the day before. If I was tired/depressed/anxious/etc. guess what? Because I had sugar. I didn't eat it for the longest time because it frustrated me so much, but my parents would still blame sugar when I told them I was depressed and anxious. When I told them I hadn't eaten any they said I was lying, and that I must have been sneaking food at school.

I don't think they even realized it had an effect on me, but it did. It was definitely a factor in developing disordered eating habits that have followed me my whole life.

OMG! I'm a nanny. My previous family was like that about food. Their thing was if they hadn't eaten yet/had too many carbs and not enough protein it would be the reason for any bad mood or fussiness. I dont think it was quite as bad as blaming it on all low emotions but definitely on a bad mood.

My mom would hide food and not let me have any thing unless it was dinner, this led to me sneaking to the kitchen at night and binging on anything I could find, then the next morning I would get in trouble and would be ashamed and then I just stopped eating at all in my house or anywhere else for days, now I just eat everything I can.

They would fill plates full of food they knew I didn’t like and would laugh at me when I struggled to eat it. As a kid if I threw up or if I took too long to finish the meal they would yell at me (maybe hit me) and tell me to go to my room and to not come out until hours later.

Honestly looking back I’ll eat food and enjoy it but there are some foods I don’t like (everyone hates certain foods) and they would only cooked these awful foods which is a very small selection and laugh each time as I struggle to eat them.

Edit: Clearing the plate used to be a thing for me but then my parents stopped caring. It’s funny because I eat like a bird still.

Honestly looking back I’ll eat food and enjoy it but there are some foods I don’t like (everyone hates certain foods) and they would only cooked these awful foods which is a very small selection and laugh each time as I struggle to eat them.

This is fucking gross. I couldn't eat red meat. But I always was forced to eat it because "You need nutrients". "No chicken isn't enough because it doesn't have as much nutrients". Even if there was another food I had to eat the meat one because I "need it", what the fuck? It's not even factually true. And I had a literal gag reflex about minced red meat (not the puking kind but the kind that makes you throw everything out of your mouth). Guess who had to eat any dish with minced red meat in it??

I wasn't laughed at or anything but I wasn't allowed to leave the kitchen until I finished or until I spent an hour there at least.

Yeah as a kid I always thought something was wrong with me and why I couldn’t eat certain foods which caused me to gag and throw up.

The food I hated in question was fish. I hate fish and fish doesn’t like me. They would make minced fish with onion and tomatoes (some other foods I don’t like) and fry them in a pan DOUSED in oil. Serve that up and call it dinner. Literally disgusting.

My grandma made me hyper aware of my weight which made me very cautious of what I ate and led to many fasting days as a teenager. I also had a short stint with purging as an older teen. Now I binge. I don't think I've had a normal eating style since I was 14 years old bc of her comments. All bc she was self conscious of her own weight and projected them onto me (I was on the lower end of healthy the entire time).

My grandma was the same way. Looks mattered above all else to her. I was 5'6 and 110 and she would tell me how fat I was, and would buy me clothes but like 2xl sizes and make comments about how they probably wouldn't fit.

It's okay! I used to struggle with it but once I realized that she was projecting I just ignored it. Still care for her deeply and do my best to try and understand her "sass" I think all my tattoos were a good distraction lol.

Have you ever dieted since? I can’t believe they compared you to her. I have a younger sister who is basically a model (and once I started losing weight, people began to realize I have the exact same natural body shape as her... ffffv) and that was always a bit hard to swallow.

If you don't need to eat it, it's wasted no matter what you do*. Do you want to waste it by eating it and making yourself gain weight and feel sick, or do you want to waste it by throwing it away where it can't have any negative impacts on your body?

*Unless you put it in a Tupperware and can trust yourself not to eat the leftovers, that is. This was too hard for me when I first started unpacking my portion control issues, so I just threw away food I didn't need.

food insecurity. there were times of plenty, and times where i didn't know when i'd eat next. so it's like, eat now, eat fast, because the gravy train is not forever and your siblings might take your share!!

also getting candy/sweets for being good was a thing, but worse was that it was pretty much the only way my parents showed they cared. sometimes i literally can't get through the day without a treat because it feels so depriving to not have that ''love''.

my dad: yOu LoOk sO tHiN, dId YoU lOsE wEiGhT?
my grandma: oMg DiD yOu GaIn WeIgHt?
like, literally on the same day...
I was quite insecure about my appearance for quite some time although I'm rather thin

I learned after I got out on my own how unhealthy my relationship with food was when I was growing up. We were always having "treats" and keeping ice cream in the house constantly, never without desserts or junk food. I learned that food was a reward and comfort. When I felt bad, I ate and ate and ate. We also had full meals no matter if we were truly hungry or not.

After I got my own my place and living with my fiance, I have many times where I feel freedom in not having to eat. And there are some nights where I'm simply not hungry because maybe I've had a slow day at work or whatever. We also don't keep much junk in the house so if it's not available, I don't eat it. I also don't have the desire to overeat like I use to. I find other things to create happiness within myself other than eat.

My mom was a very positive influence concerning my relationship with food. The main things I learned from her were 1) Do your own research (don't trust the media or labels - millions of dollars go into having you buy a product) and 2) Adjust your diet as you adjust your life (the energy you needed at 9 is not the same needed at 16). I strongly believe those two things have resulted in me never being over weight and always being very active.

What fucked me up the most was working in food service. All types of food service. My min would get blown daily about the awful decisions people made and teh guilt they had while making them - that was the worst part. I had many obese regulars who would do this song/dance twice daily about how they shouldn't and they always did. It just made me realize I don't want to turn into one of those people in which food owns them. Really helped me develop the eat to live not live to eat mentality.

my stepmom physically FORCED me to drink milk. I think she thought I was being a lazy kid not drink her milk or whatever, but I truly didn't like it. To this day I rarely drink milk. I may cook with it, but I'll get sick if I drink it. Not LI either because I can have cheese.

Excluding fruit. Fruit was expensive AF and my mom made sure I knew it. She went out of her way to make fruit salads and animals and just cut them all cute. I legit inhale fruit as an adult. I LOVE fruit more than dessert. Fruit IS my dessert.

In hindsight she was just a sweet lady who couldn't have kids of her own and she tried her hardest, but Lord was she misinformed. This was in the 90's so I think a lot of parents were. That's why I think it's so important to do your own research and not trust what you hear. The 90's must have been a God awful time for parents because they had Internet, yes, but they didn't have the wealth of information they had for FREE so they tried to do their best based on what they heard only to realize they were all gimmicks or scams.

I remember my mom crying when she learned how bad Fruitopia was. It was expensive and trendy and I wanted it and you know; FRUIT. So I begged her to get it and I drank 2 cans daily and got awful canker sores for months because of all the sugar. When she looked into what those ingredients were there was no fruit,.

When I was 10 my parents divorced and I was the youngest of 3 siblings. My mom had an eating disorder she never discussed, always eating dry cereal late at night because she hasn't eaten enough during the day. My brother would wake up at midnight and eat meals, just raid the fridge. My sister was always snacking at odd hours. One night I poured myself some cereal and sat down and I just hear "WHOA WHAT ARE YOU DOING." I was so confused, my family all ate at night. I was scolded by my mom and siblings for eating so late. I remember my brother discussing with my mom that I shouldn't be allowed to eat so late, and I essentially had a food curfew when no one else did. From 10 years old to about 18 I would sneak food, I was so humiliated to eat in front of my family. I'd sneak into the kitchen and hide snacks and sneak away. My family would suggest all the time that I needed to lose weight or watch what I ate. When I was 11 I realized that if I skipped breakfast my stomach wouldn't look as big. It began an eating disorder that I still have at 25. I binged and fasted constantly in my teens. I've been stressed recently and my natural reaction is to avoid food. For the longest time I saw it as something evil.

Also constantly shaming me about food because of my weight. "Are you sure she needs to eat that?" Yes, god damnit. It's a cup of broccoli steamed to absolute grey mush, no salt, no pepper, no butter, no herbs, no cheese. Just grey mush--your mother-in-law's fucking masterpiece of culinary art. All I've had to eat all day is a god damn peanut butter sandwich and a school size carton of milk for free lunch at school since we are too broke to afford anything. Let me eat my grey mush in peace.

I love to cook. Cooking is science for me. But I hate food. I just tell myself I love it so I will actually eat. Took years and years of therapy to undo a fraction of the fucking up my family has done with food.

Also, and it's not about my family, mostly the view on food in my country, that a good dinner consists of 1.soup 2. meat with a side (rice, potaties, pasta) and 3. dessert. That's just freaking wrong on so many levels. There is no culture of eating vegetables. Up to this day I feel guilty ordering fresh veggies in a restaurant because "why pay three times something I can do at home" so I end up ordering fries.

So much this. Whenever I am ordering a veggie heavy dish (mostly available in salad forms) at restaurant, people think I am dieting. My ideal kind of meal is 50-70% non-starch veggies, 15-20% meat/protein, and remainder a starchy side and a light fruit based dessert. It is so hard to find at most US restaurants unless it’s a salad place or build-your-own-bowl kind of fast casual chain like chipotle.

I'm the summer, budgets were tight and I wasn't able to get as much food as I wanted, healthy or not. More expensive items (chips or cookies or fresh vegetables, etc) were examined very closely. To this day, when I buy vegetables, I feel very guilty, and often limit myself.

My mom also used to make me help her with dinner, regardless of whether or not I want to. The longer the meal was, the more involved I was. And if I talked back or refused, whew. So now, no more meatloaf or lasagna for me. Forever.

My family is very traditional, so the women always cooked and my dad and my brother never did, they just got to eat. It's made me feel very subservient, and I catch myself wanting to cook for people who can and should learn to do it themselves or at least, we all do it together.

Meanwhile my mother served nothing but pasta because we were poor and got upset if I didn't eat it all, and also I was on medication for allergies that made me gain weight easily.

Then as I got older...

"Strippers are so empowered" - my grandma

"Try this diet" - my grandma to pre-teen me

"You're so thin and that's wonderful!" - my grandma to me after I developed an eating disorder around age 15

She then proceeded to buy me literally stripper clothes. Like literally stage clothes she bought from a stripper.

Not to mention that every single time I saw her she made comments about my weight/looks, so every Thanksgiving was a bunch of underhanded comments about how I should 'do something' about my face (light acne) or that I 'really needed to lose weight so that I wouldn't be alone forever' (told to me after I got divorced and was about a size 10 instead of my usual size 6).

I have cut contact with that toxic manipulative woman for a variety of reasons.

​

So I guess to sum it up...I feel compelled to finish a meal even if I'm full, due to being guilted by my mother, while also feeling that my value is tied to my looks/weight and feeling that I have less value if I am heavier and I should be ashamed.

My Father has been calling me fat since I was very very young. I restrict my food intake when I was about 10 years old which I feel affected my height... and I remember my mum encouraged me to eat salad instead of what my siblings ate when I was 12. It damaged my self-esteem as a child. I am thankful how we are embracing diversity in beauty and teaching girls that we have so much to give to the world than our outer appearance. I wish I had that positivity growing up.

My mom criticizing her own body all the time and telling me to not get fat like her - caused a LOT of body insecurity in myself since I was young

My mom saying “do you really need a second serving since I was 8 or so

My mom and grandma constantly suggesting that perhaps I should try things in a bigger size even when I was at a healthy weight

Teaching my that exercise is punishment for eating “bad” food

Constantly. Commenting. On. My. Body. Whether it’s bigger or smaller or my waist now “has a shape” or doesn’t I don’t want to hear it. I saw an article or something about “how to talk to your daughter about her body” and it essentially says “don’t” and instead of saying things like “ you have broad shoulders” say “your arms are strong”. I 100% agree with this and if I ever have kids will use this. The comments, whether they were good or bad made me hyperaware of my body and contributed to body dysmorphia.

As many others have said, the clean plate thing. Wasting food is unforgivable! I saw a saying along the lines of you’re wasting the food whether you toss it or eat it so you might as well treat your body right and I try to live by that now.

From these types of things I developed disordered eating (maybe an ED? I never was formally diagnosed but that shit sucked) and they would praise my weight loss as I was eating 600 cals/day max and doing loads of cardio manically. I never openly discussed my body insecurity or disordered eating with anyone in my family but the thing is they knew I was doing that to myself and never thought to step in and say “hey maybe what you’re doing isn’t healthy”. I still struggle with some body dysmorphia and catch myself slipping into old habits as I now try to lose weight in a healthy way but i’m doing much better.

1 was definitely my mom too. i remember we'd go shopping for clothes together and she'd look so sad at me when the clothes i picked out fit me, but hers didn't. love her to bits, but she def was a huge proponent to my own ED. :(

They constantly criticized/made fun of my weight, and I developed disordered eating by age 11 or 12. Sometimes my step-mother would get back at me by making me eat food that had spoiled because I didn't eat it before it went bad, so I am particular about dates. I am a lot better since I cut contact with them.

I think my experience is very different than a lot of responses on here - my mom would take me out for fast food and ice cream whenever I had a bad day.

We would go through multiple drive-thrus sometimes (normally McDonalds for food, followed by Dairy Queen for ice cream, followed by Starbucks for a fancy drink to bring home with us) and eat in the car while driving around and talking. It always made me feel better, but now I associate taking care of myself when I’m sad with binge eating, which isn’t healthy.

My mother would make me feel guilty for finishing my food and would remind me of it constantly all day. Telling me, “ No wonder your fat” or “No one is going to love you if you keep eating like that” it would just anger me and make me eat more to spite her.

Had to clear your plate- I posted once about how my mom made me eat squash I had yakked up as a punishment for such a thing- her dad used to do it to her I guess, but over-eating became something I definitely had to un-teach myself. I'm still working on my weight, but its not a 'struggle' anymore.

I remember when I told her about it, she was put out, and when I told her what my daily limit was, she said "Thats too little!" "Are you sure thats enough?"

i know she doesn't like herself very much, so I don't let it bother me when she behaves this way, and my dad grew up poor, so he always has had the 'clear your plate' mentality because you didn't know when your next meal was.

Emotional eating is another thing I had to deal with. When I was tired, anxious, bored- I would eat.

I'm still tired, anxious and bored, so when i eat at those points I try really hard to either not eat, drink water or eat something that is a 'nothing' food- I love carrots, radishes, brussel sprouts- stuff that isn't bad for me, and not a lot of calories.

Will ask me to get more food. Or say I was way too picky about my food when they'll cook these bizarre Asian dishes I didn't even like or felt comfortable eating. I'm not picky. I just don't like your cooking and they couldn't cook for the life of them.

Talk in a backhanded way about my weight, I needed to "fill my face in more". I was way too skinny. No the Fuck I'm Not. I'm a healthy weight for my height.

Now I barely eat unless I'm really hungry or I'll just snack a lot because I never liked any food on the table

While I realize my situation is similar to most of these comments - being forced to finish my plates, even as a young child my parents prepared me essentially the same portions as they did for themselves. So definitely being forced to over eat, which led to thinking now if I don’t finish a whole plate I’m “wasteful” or making myself feel terrible and finishing plates.

Anyway, interesting counter part. My boyfriend and I discussed this recently. We are both healthy, active people, ideal body types. When he was young, his mother never forced him to finish a plate. She encouraged him to eat what he wanted because “ you know your tummy better than I do “. I think about that a lot.

my mother commenting “you just ate” when asking for seconds (please, sir, can i have some more? MORE?!?) when i was in elementary school
telling me to suck in my stomach
commenting on weight loss with praise
“don’t eat that. it’s pure fat”
listening to mother saying how she’s fat and then smacking me when she’d ask if she was fat and i replied yes because lack of understanding

We didn't have extra money for activities or going out to do things (i.e. local pool, movies, sports teams, etc.) and live in a very stormy/grey part of the US so parks were hit or miss depending on the weather- therefore we spent a lot of time baking to pass the time. Then eating it to celebrate our accomplishment and feel good. So eating and baking and cooking became an activity and way to cure boredom instead of a way to sustain. Flour, sugar, and butter were always around and accessible. Now I'm a huge boredom eater.

Both my parents are very overweight so overeating and snacking was normal. I'm the youngest of 4 so they were just sick as shit of trying to force kids to eat anything, as long as I ate SOMETHING that was enough. So most of the time that meant I ate a PB&J and cookies for dinner while everyone else had actual food. I was never forced to eat anything I didn't want to, so I'm now extremely picky and eat a very small range of food.

I've lost 75 pounds and I try really hard to expand my food horizons, but most things just look / sound / feel gross to me and I can't do it.

When I was younger (think 12 years old, 5'1, 125lbs), my dad often made fun of my weight. He'd tell me my thin friends looked better than me, that no one liked me because I was fat but wouldn't tell me out of respect, and that I should eat less because I was fat. Obviously, I began to hate how I looked but couldn't do much about it. I began running when I was 13 and felt healthier, but now my exercise was under scrutiny. At family dinners, I was always told to eat more which didn't make sense because a day or so earlier, I was just told I was fat!

Trigger Alert!

When I was 15, I developed an eating disorder and lost almost 20 pounds. This was due to major restricting and exercise--once I had banana bread and felt so bad about it that I skipped dinner. Lunch was half a sandwich and fruit, sometimes a granola bar. I was not getting my period, but I was so happy because I was thin, and I felt that people would like me more. My parents were furious about my habits and demanded I eat more, so I did and gained all 20lbs back by binge-eating.

​

I eat normally now, but I still feed the weight of words said to me in my childhood. I always want to be dieting, feel guilty when I eat high-calorie foods, and always wish I could be as thin as x person or y person. Just an overall dip in self-esteem. It's very unfortunate because I feel like I could be so much more confident and care-free if my dad took a different approach with me.

I'm lucky in that my parents realized their bad relationship with food so when I was a kid/teen I was educated on why the habits were bad. So they weren't really passed down to me.

Big one is my dad. The man is in his 60's and he still struggles with the effects of growing up in a very poor family with a lot (13!!) kids. Mainly that no food should be wasted so he would clean up his plate (and everyone else's). If it's a toss between throwing it out (because it's say, leftovers that can't be reheated and eating the rest of it - he will want to eat the rest of it. Even if he is full. Obviously this causes weight problems.

He could have instilled that in me but luckily my mom recognized it for what it is and calls him out on it all the time.

It took me a long time to learn how to have a healthy diet. My parents are ignorant when it comes to health. They take their dietary knowledge from television commercials, talk shows and word of mouth from other equally unaware friends. I grew up with ideas like American cheese being healthy, fruit juice being the same as a piece of fruit, fries counting as a serving of vegetables and that it doesn't count as a meal if it doesn't have meat. And serving sizes are what fit on large dinner plates, not what's outlined on the packaging. And that a crap diet or dietary intolerances could be fixed with OTC digestive meds. Needless to day, I felt ten pounds of shit shoved into a two pound bag well into my adulthood until I started making some meaningful changes.

Actually, my parents forced me to be healthy. They were European so I wasn't allowed a lot of the processed stuff like Kool-Aid, Wonder Bread etc. It was torture because all the other kids had it. In the end, I came to appreciate that they were right to avoid eating too much fake crap.

They always talked about who had gained weight. For example, if they had run into someone they hadn’t seen in some time they’d say, ‘wow, so-and-so has really put in weight’. These conversations usually happened over dinner, which was the only time all the family really got together and chatted.

My dad is a selfish, narcissistic, bigoted ass hole. When my siblings (2 brothers and one sister, all younger than me by 2, 4, and 9 years) my dad did a lot of withholding things. For example, our bath towels were small and raggedy and had holes, while he kept big fresh fluffy white ones for himself and we couldn't touch them (which doesn't sound like a big deal but to a young girl going through puberty and him making comments about my body that was exposed from the holes, it was a huge deal). With food, he'd get steaks for himself, give us the fatty pieces so he didn't feel guilty for not sharing, and we'd eat canned pasta. He kept fresh veggies for himself and we had canned, he'd get tasty looking cakes from bakeries and sodas and chips all for himself and we weren't allowed any of his foods. We had dinner or bologna sandwiches or nothing. Then when money was tight he still ate like a king, and we'd barely have food for ourselves. Me being the oldest, it led to me going days not eating anything but school lunches so my siblings could eat. On weekends I'd eat a piece of bread with mustard and ketchup when the hunger pains got really intense. I got a job at 15 to help my siblings eat better and have new clothes not from thrift stores, shoes without holes, real haircuts, school supplies, etc. (Side note: my dad wore expensive suits, went golfing twice a week, bought expensive clubs, smoked expensive cigars, drank expensive alcohol, got a haircut every other week, bought expensive electronics we weren't allowed to touch, ect. The. Whole. Time.) This led to hoarding food, being afraid and feeling guilty for spending my income on anything other than food, having a serious problem sharing food later in life, eating rotten or moldy food, eating out of garbage bins, eating all the leftovers out of friends refrigerators, and having three jobs at once my junior and senior years in highschool to make sure my siblings are and had everything they needed. Oh, and in my junior year I got sent to a psych ward bc I was so skinny my parents assumed I was anorexic, never realizing I had lost so much weight due to the toxic environment they forced us to live in.

Edit: sorry for the wall of text, on mobile app. Edit 2: I just remembered a recent event.
I was staying at my boyfriends moms house and he made a comment about me eating his mother's food and it humiliated and hurt me so bad I didn't eat for 4 days besides a piece of bread with mustard and ketchup at night with my meds. He didn't mean it the way I heard it, but still I felt incredibly guilty.

My father and brother have always binge eaten all the food for themselves. If I buy a carton of cookies, my brother will take it up to his room and eat the whole thing by the next morning. When I was a kid and had a lot of my birthday cake left over, I never got a second piece because my dad would happily eat half a cake overnight. Then there have been the times I bought something needed to bring for lunch, and they ate all of it. I've had to learn to "binge eat" too, because otherwise I never get anything. It's always gone too quickly.

My favorite thing is when they eat each other's food and get mad at each other. That's the only time they understand how my mom and I feel. Otherwise they think it's a-ok to eat all of someone else's food. Both of them eat like they're the only person in the house.

I was always scolded for not finishing literally everything on my plate - even though I was not allowed to dish my own food out and the portions were gigantic and extra heaping portions of the foods I didn't like.

That, and not eating enough - even though I always had 2 plates of food when available (more than anyone else ever really ate) and I was simply a very very active and skinny kid.

To top it off, we didn't routinely go to the grocery store. So, this led to having one week where we had a pantry full of anything you could ever want, then the next week running out of some of the staples but still having snacks around, and then the next week we had only very little in the fridge and pantry. Which meant that we were binge eating most of the time. It gave us a very "eat it while it's here" attitude about food.

My mom was “allergic” to most vegetables and fruits. No salsa, no ketchup, no apples, no oranges, no peppers, strawberries, anything. The only good thing to come out of her cheating on my dad is now we can have whatever food we want in the house.

We were lower middle class, so there was definitely more non-perishable food consumed than fresh. We ate a lot of KD, hamburger helper, pasta in a can. I find I still crave that type of food more than healthy food most of the time. It sucks.

We didn't snack because we weren't allowed to. Hungry after school? Too bad, dinner will be ready in 3 hours. I remember hunger pains every day until I just didn't get them anymore. Also being little and our food wasn't allowed to be changed (want your apple cut up? No, eat it the way it is or don't eat at all). My parents loved us but were really controlling and I think little changes made them feel out of control. This contributed to a lonnnng lasting issue with food. I still find myself skipping meals just to see if I can make it through the day, and I get a sense of pride when I do. Certainly not as bad as I used to be now that I'm an adult and my husband helps me determine what's fucked up lol, but I know that it's still lurking.

My father was a "child of the Depression," and thus had the habit of making one meal to last a week. It was generally whatever meat was on Manager's special, thrown together with nearly rotting vegetables on clearance. Meatloaf, check. Stew, check. More stews, check. Come Saturday, the thought of eating the same exact meal for dinner we just had for six nights straight (which by now was now growing things in the fridge) was just nausea inducing. Now I cannot eat a meal of leftovers. Ever. Even if it's something I cooked that morning. Don't give me your Thanksgiving leftovers, grandma. That shenanigans is going straight into the trash once I get home.

Throughout all of this, I never enjoyed the taste of meat. 12-yr old me decided to go vegetarian because, why not? I basically ate that way anyway. Cue the incessant mocking from my father. I was told I was too picky, too young to understand, etc. He would make fun of me with waiters when we went out to eat. Want veggie tacos at a Mexican restaurant? Dad would use air quotes and call them "air tacos" and laugh at me, while the waiter would stand there in uncomfortable silence, uncertain of how to react to the child with their head down in sadness in their booth. Screw that nonsense. I am in my 30s now, and still have issues asking for a vegetarian menu/options when I am eating anywhere but my house. I am very much that person that will eat at home before going out somewhere that involves eating in front of others. Public judgement and mockery screws with a person, especially when they are just a child.

If people were over she would serve us heaping plates of food and pull the "starving kids in China, sit at the table until you finish it" thing with no remorse or pity. I guess to prove how good a home maker/parent she was.

When we were alone at the table I would get maybe 1000 calories per day of food tops, because she had to have the skinniest prettiest daughter in the neighbour hood.

I have a bad food hoarding habit that I'm working on. I also tend to overcook and overeat to the point of feeling sick if I make my dinner while hungry. The starvation & abundance cycles I went through left me with a subconcious instinct to stuff my face without realizing it.

I was always told to eat, even if I wasn't hungry. Now I use food to cope with pretty much everything. I've gotten betterish, and have lost around 40 pounds over a couple of years.

The other thing is I'm always terrified of cooking anything that requires more effort than I'm comfortable with (isn't much). I was never taught how to cook literally anything, but God damn would I be mocked and ridiculed when I eventually burned eggs, overcooked pasta, etc. when I was a teen.

I've been moved out of my parents for almost 6 years now and still to this day they hesitate or refuse to eat anything I have made because I guess there's no way I could have taught myself anything in the last 6 years.

My mom constantly talked about her body in a negative way and hardly even picked at her food when she ate. I was a little chunky as a kid and she'd sometimes comment on it –– I remember her saying "you see that little roll of fat coming from your waist? That's called a muffin top and we don't want those." Big surprise that I developed an eating disorder in my teens.

My dad's entire family is fucked up about food and bodies and as a result two of his sisters and a few of my cousins and I ended up with eating disorders. I'm still struggling but diagnoses is now listed as "in partial remission" and I spent six months doing a treatment program last year. Six months isn't enough to undo a solid 12 years of disordered eating behaviors.

I think the best way to illustrate my story is to describe the care package my mom sent me after I gave birth to my first child, 25 years ago. Inside the box was:

A low-fat cookbook (I want to say it was called "Butter Busters")

Two sports bras

Workout pants

A mega pack of Chips Ahoy (my favorite cookies)

Three bags of my favorite chocolate candy

So, yeah. My relationship with food and weight has ALWAYS been terrible because of my mother's own insecurities with her weight and appearance. I have done everything in my power to not communicate my insecurities to my daughters, but when it is so ingrained into who you are, it's really hard.

Oh, I just remembered another story, this time from when I was 10. I had just moved to Germany with my parents and we were out hiking in Bavaria. I had never been a particularly athletic, much less active child, so I'm sure that I was pretty whiny about the whole experience. What I do recall, though, is my mom bribing me to walk by giving me a square of Milka every few feet. I also remember the look of absolute disgust on my father's face every time I took the chocolate. As my mother told me years later (when I weighed close to 300 pounds), "Your father hates fat people."

This thread is simultaneously making me sad that other people had similar experiences but less alone. I don't talk about my eating disorder a lot and I don't care if anyone reads this or not. I'm just sad that I've lost so much of my life to eating disorders. I have a distinct memory of going to a desert/music night for my sister's band and my dad commented on how much/what I was eating. So I walked the half mile home and threw it up. I wish I didn't feel so much shame and guilt around food. I feel horrible guilt over enjoying food and regularly buy things I don't really like to not feel bad for liking food/eating. I've been having a hard time not crying in the shower because I don't want to touch my body. I should probably try to make an appointment with my therapist.

everything I ate was always controlled for me and I had to eat all of it growing up poor my mother hated wasting food. now that I'm an adult and not living at home I over control what I eat to the point of only eating the same 3-4 meals I know I like and eating once a day.

My mother chided and sometimes humiliated my sister and I for being fat while making enormous portions of fatty and carb-heavy foods. If we didn't eat much of it, she complained about all of the hard work she did and how we didn't eat it. She also rewarded us with snacks (candy, chips) when we were very young and continued to purchase those foods in high volume.

Both of my parents have always been overweight, and they role-modeled their behavior (sedentary lifestyle, lots of snacking and eating huge portions). I didn't know what a normal portion was until I'd been in college a few years and seen more of how other people lived. I lived at home through college so it took longer than it might have.

I had to eat vegetables every night but it was always... plain steamed / boiled broccoli, or plain raw carrots. No roasted or sauteed vegetables or anything with a sauce or even salt and pepper. Once I realized you could cook vegetables in different ways and add different sauces and seasonings, I loved them

Eating large portions of meat with few to no vegetables, all slathered in some type of gravy made from the meat. When I moved out on my own 3 years ago, I finally discovered vegetables are quite delicious and now only eat meat 1-2 times per week if I'm feeling it.

​

When I was younger, I was also never forced to eat a full meal or sit down at the table so when I do finally get to sit for a full meal, I eat it very quickly; otherwise, I will snack all day long on anything I can get my hands on.

One day, like 10 years ago, my dad said he didn't want to have dinner anymore. My mom, who hates cooking, decided to stop doing it, not only for him but for me too. I was 10 years old at the moment. I grew up eating cheese sandwiches.

I'm not a kitchen lover myself (guess why) so I just got used to it, and only a couple years ago I started eating a little better.

My mother was a terrible cook. She could take the safest ingredients and render them inedible by overcooking, undercooking, underseasoning, turning them to mush, etc. She got furious at us if we complained or refused to eat it. I learned how to cook at age 8 or 9 just out of self-preservation, but she rarely let me cook. If I did, I had to use certain ingredients and not others. A lot of the time the available ingredients were infested with vermin or past the due date. You get the picture.

I was a bag of bones, and always hungry. I started stuffing my face with junk food when I was at school, or on my way home from school, or I'd sneak candy, chips, etc. into my bedroom. That's how I stayed sane, if not exactly healthy.

I learned that my needs didn't matter one bit. My taste buds didn't matter, and nothing about me mattered at all. I was there for my mother and she wasn't there for me. I developed some seriously unhealthy eating habits that I'm still (DECADES later) trying to unlearn. I also hate to cook. Fortunately I never developed an eating disorder or gained more than 10 or 15 extra pounds.

My parents always finish each meal with talking about how they regretted eating that much. It's like food is something they can't just enjoy after the fact. As a result, I feel guilty after almost every meal, questioning every choice I made. It sucks, I've gotten better with food and body image in general, but I still struggle.

my mom always told me she was 90lbs when she got married at 22. When I hit triple digits in high school i panicked. Im now 22 and weigh 125... my mom send me hundreds of dollars worth of diet food each month and reminds me how overweight I am. I also have celiac and most of my weigh gain is from going gluten free but... its making it difficult to eat healthy

My dad was/is a health nut. We didn’t really ever have anything he considered “heart attack food” in the house growing up. Basically, no fats of any kind. Add to that the fact that both parents are extremely frugal. Growing up, we were probably lower middle to middle class, but I thought we were poor considering all the things we didn’t have that my friends did - microwave, color tv, new cloths every season, more than one pair of shoes, etc.

I was the youngest and was admittedly a picky eater when young. Because of that I was ALWAYS given the smallest portion and there were no seconds in my house. I just accepted this meager amount of “healthy” food because I assumed that’s all we could afford. The result was me being extremely skinny (5’9” and 100lbs in high school). I never exercised because I didn’t want to burn any more calories than necessary.

Now at 45 I’m skinny fat due to now eating whatever I want, a slower metabolism, and not exercising. And I am slightly pissed that my parents didn’t see how unhealthy that lifestyle was for a growing kid.

Edit: I’m also horrified when visiting my husband’s family and seeing his nephews heap seconds and thirds of “heart attack food” on their plates and my mother-in-law encouraging them to not leave the table hungry. Yes, they are overweight. There is a balance!

I think my parents fucked up my relationship with food by allowing me to have whatever I wanted. When I was adopted at almost 2, they said I would eat anything and everything they would give me. As I got older, I, like many kids, got pickier about the foods I liked to eat. So my parents wouldn't make me eat the same meal as they did, they would make me something I wanted EVERY NIGHT. This continued into my teens and they never encouraged me to branch out and try new things or make me eat the same meals as they did. If we went to a restaurant that didn't have a meal I would eat, we would leave, or pick me up food later, or have the chef cook something special for an extra price. Now, at 21, I can't stand the taste or texture of most veggies and meats. I see all of these beautifully cooked meals online that I want to try, but when I start looking at the ingredients, I know I won't enjoy how it tastes. I hate being limited to chicken, potatoes, broccoli and junk food, even though I know it's all in my head. :(

My parents are divorced. My mom hates cooking and had maybe 8 recipes total in her repertoire, most of them are very fatty/greasy. She also works late so my sister and I ate frozen meals A LOT. My dad likes to cook, but we only saw him on weekends growing up, so to make the time we spent together special he'd take us out to eat a lot. I didn't get a real understanding of what healthy food and nutrition were until college when I went on my first diet (because BIG SURPRISE eating frozen TGI Fridays appetizers or fast food almost every day makes you fat). My parents never said anything about my weight, but it was obvious enough to me. I hated that I was overweight, I thought I was ugly, but I had no clue how to fix it when I was in middle school and high school.

​

I eat a lot better now, but moving home after college kind of sucked because my mom frowns on a lot of the "health" foods that I eat. Fake butter, reduced-fat cheese, zucchini noodles and *gasp* cauliflower crust pizza??? In her mind, you should just eat whatever food you want and when you hit your calorie quota for the day, stop eating; even if you're hungry. It was hard not to go back to my old eating habits when I lived there. My relationship with food has improved immensely since I moved out.

My grandmother used to poke me in the stomach and make comments about how long I’d “jiggle” after. Then when puberty hit me like a bus and I got my first period at 9, everyone said it was because I was soooooo unhealthy and the excess fat did it. I was bulimic all through middle and high school, but now that I’m back up to a size 10, my family keeps hinting I should go on a diet or strict exercise routine with them, disguised as asking for a partner to motivate them. They quit as soon as I actually start, and the cycle repeats when I give up.

My mom forced me on diets starting in 5th grade, grabbed at my stomach and neck/chin area to “show me” where I was fat. Not only did it ruin my relationship with food, it also made me hate my body completely. I feel guilty when I eat but I eat anyways, I can’t stand my picture being taken and I avoid mirrors unless I’m brushing my hair/teeth or putting on make up.

There was never really any food in the house so I scarf food down without tasting it sometimes. It's like I panic and think someone will steal it before I'm able to eat it which is also something that happened. I would make food and someone else would just eat it before I could and literally evilly laugh at me because there's no food left and they were too lazy to cook anything. And I hate when people take my food without asking or expect to just take food off my plate. I don't like sharing any food off my plate. I also hate when people expect me to cook for them without helping me.

I always had to ask for food before eating or going for seconds so I feel extremely guilty eating other people's food that they cooked or just food at their house in general, or if they bought it. I would rather starve than eat other people's food. I don't feel like I'm entitled to food unless I bought it.

When I was in 2nd grade I had a Christmas performance for school and during the intermission, my grandma told me “suck your stomach in, no one wants to see that” and that by constantly sucking my stomach in, it would make it more toned and keep me from getting fat.

When I had eating disorders at 14, my grandma forced me to go to therapy when she found out. Only, she didn’t care about me starving myself, she just needed an excuse to finally tell someone she thought I was a lesbian (I’m not) so they could “fix” me. I went for three weeks, and then she never made me go again. I think she realized my therapist wouldn’t called CPS on her for an array of shitty things she did constantly.

Where do we even begin? My mother doesn't like food. Yes, that's right, my mother doesn't really like food. She would be happy to eat peanut butter and bananas and nothing else.

Both of my parents have foods they think are bad. For my mother, if it has flavor, it must be bad. Salty, spicy, sweet, savory, doesn't matter, if it has flavor, must be bad. For my dad, anything that tastes sweet and/or rich must be bad. If someone eats bad food, that person must also be bad. So much judgement toward food and people who eat food they deem bad. As far as they are concerned, the only way to deal with bad foods, is to avoid them. If you can't abstain from bad food, then there is something wrong with you and you are a bad person. Needless to say, I was often considered bad because I like food.

But I did absorb some of these lessons. There were a lot of foods that we didn't buy when I was growing up, sugary cereal, sodas, chips, store-bought cookies, crackers, and the like. I didn't buy this stuff for my kids, either.

When I was younger, I used to eat pretty slowly and savor my food. That is, until my brother started stealing it. Halloween, Easter, and Christmas candy that I would be able to make last over a month slowly eating it, would disappear within a day. If my mom got me special snacks I’d requested from the store, if I didn’t grab them off the counter the second she got home I wouldn’t get any. Not even food from my plate was safe. If I’d put something aside like a roll or something to eat last, my brother would steal it and scarf it down. And my parents would do nothing. They’d just shrug and say, “if you wanted it, you should have eaten it.”

This gave me really awful binge eating disorder, as I started immediately and quickly scarfing down my food to protect it. I can’t keep anything in the house, I’ll just end up eating it all and making myself sick. I don’t even enjoy it. It’s just ingrained in me that if I don’t eat it now, I won’t get any. I’ll eat full sleeves of Oreos, entire pizzas, full tubs of ice cream. I don’t even taste it at this point. I dunno how to train myself out of it. It’s awful.

Marking me clear my plate. I was petite and healthy, but too picky for my parents. So I needed to eat everything that was given to me. Also, pointing out my “flaws” and recommending diet changes to fix them. “Ooo look, you’re getting cellulite! Here, drink more water, eat more meat, and take these MLM supplements to make it go away.”
Thanks mom, at 13 I definitely needed insecurities about my virtually nonexistent cellulite and I totes needed your MLM bullshit to fix it...even though I was THIRTEEN YEARS OLD and smaller than a freaking size zero.
Those supplements fucked up my metabolism and energy levels, and I was never the same. If I’d just stayed healthy, vegetarian, and active(like I was), I never would have become reliant on outside sources to “fix” my body. And I never would have had anything to “fix” if I’d been allowed a modicum of autonomy and been allowed to eat what made me feel good. Turns out, my natural cravings for vegetables are far healthier for me than the foods I was forced to eat as a child/teen. If I’d been encouraged to find balance and listen to my body, I would have found confidence and health a looooong time ago. Being a vegetarian/vegan was what my body craved, and it was forced out of my because meat and cheese were more important to my parents than true health.

Using treats as a reward-sweets, desserts, icecream etc had to be earned and was seen as something special, which means that I spent many years trying to rid myself of the habit 'I've had a bad day, I deserve this treat' and 'I've had a good day, I need to celebrate'.

My mother was very obese when I was growing up and she refused to eat at friends places, when I had company over, basically whenever we were around people we didn’t live with. This made me think I’m supposed to be ashamed of eating in front of people, so I hated going out to eat or having meals with significant others and their parents. If I stayed at a friends for a weekend I went without eating the entire time. Even glasses of water were hard to drink. Not as bad as some other things posted here, but I’m 30 now and slowly starting to get better.

Growing up, I was kind of a chubby kid and my mom was a super tone fitness maniac. She always tried to have me on a strict diet and taught me how to count calories from a very young age. She never failed to make it very known that she was embarrassed of my weight. She’d weigh me all the time and yell at me if I ever gained anything and then make me exercise until I couldn’t breathe.

During the majority of my childhood, we also lived with my grandma, who like in true grandma fashion, let me have whatever I wanted and encouraged me to eat however much I wanted. She would sneak junk food and snacks in my lunch box and take me out for fast food without my mom knowing. She taught me how to hide food and be secretive about what I ate.

Long story short, I ended up developing a variety of eating disorders and even though I have been in recovery for a few years now, I am still incredibly finicky when it comes to food. I sometimes find myself in moods where when it comes to food, I either have to have it all or nothing.

Until about age 6, I wouldn’t want to eat so my dad would threaten me in all types of way to eat. One of his methods was putting hot candle wax drop by drop in my leg until I was eating while crying without really chewing.

So when I did start eating after being afraid of the consequences, I begin to gain weight and became a chubby child around age 7. That’s when the ridicule and mockery began with my weight. Everyday reminder to not eat the chips my brother was eating or not asking for snacks at my cousins’ house even if I was hungry. Constantly comparing my body to that of my friends and cousins and why they were so skinny and I wasn’t.

But then when I would want to diet and not eat as an early teen, they wouldn’t let me. It made me really confused. Fast forward a few year and I was diagnosed with PCOS and they won’t accept the fact that my weight isn’t completely under my control and despite not eating much, I am still overweight.

My parents definitely meant well but...I have two very athletic little sisters who were competitive distance runners. They got more attention than I did for their sport simply because it took up more time, and my mom had a lot of special food that was JUST for them for after practices and whatnot (Gatorades, chocolate milks, snacks, etc.). We were on a budget back then so I get the careful rationing of more expensive stuff. I got punished for sneaking their snacks. Seeing them get more attention and special food for their exercise habits was definitely an underlying factor in my later exercise addiction and eating disorder, although I wasn’t aware of that when I was in it.

They also had to go to special stores to get clothes to fit their bodies—special “slim” sizes in our school uniforms. I’ve been thin to average my entire life, but not “so tiny and athletic that I need special clothes” thin. They got better clothes and more of them. I get that my parents did their best and meant no harm.

I was born with severe stomach and digestion issues and until I was 2 would throw up anything but breastmilk and then when I did start eating food food everything made me sick. My Mom did not take me to the doctor becuase when I saw then as a baby the would not give me a fair chance at life, saying this like she will be mentally challenged, she will never walk, she won't succeed in life and my Mom didn't believe it.

By the time I was 5 or 6 I had basically learned that eating food would make me barf and that I didn't like barfing. By this point my mom and almost completly figured out what I could eat but had to feed me via distraction and the new doctor who could tell I was fine and normal just encouraged Mom to get whatever calories she could into me. So she would sit me down infront of the TV distracted with a large plate of food and I would just absent-mindedly munch away.

This was fine till I was about 11 and started to hit puberty. Somthing about puberty fixed a lot of my digestion issues and I could suddenly eat most things. So I did. And everyone in my life was so happy I was finally eating food where so happy they never took the time to make sure portion sizes where ok or that exercise to burn calories was happening. As a result by 14 I was 4ft 8in and 145 lbs and I've just kept getting fatter and fatter.

I am a picky eater, afraid to try new things because I remember being so sick most of my childhood and when i do find somthing that doesn't make me sick I don't have much of a concept of how much I should or shouldn't eat. When I'm eating with others as soon as they decide to stop eating I feel like I should also stop, no matter what is left on my plate.

I was a picky eater. My mom would force me to eat foods I didn’t like or I’d sit at the dinner table for hours. There were times she forced me to eat foods I didn’t like, and I vomited them straight back onto the dining table.

Guess what? I’m a grown adult now, and I still don’t like ANY of those foods, which I think is a real shame. I’ll never know if I actually don’t like them or if I just have some kind of psychological complex about it

Mine isn't as serious as others here, and it's really only about 1 food. My sister when we were growing up was obsessed with green olives. She'd eat them by the jar, and drink the juice, and the smell always kinda grossed me out but I never said anything about it. Until one day she went into my room and rubbed the olive juice all over my pillows and my N64 controllers. Now I hate olives. THANKS JERK.

My mum was a compulsive eater and would force me to eat unhealthy snacks with her so it would alleviate her own guilt. I realized as an adult I snack a lot and usually I comfort eat during times when I'm down or stressed.

She'd also force me to eat stuff I didn't like and yell "STUPID" if I didn't want to. Over time I naturally began to eat all the things I had a childhood aversion too so I was able to avoid being fucked up by her too much, but I still resent her for it.

culture.. the family just don't want to be open minded about what is healthy, facts.. etc they just stick with what they know out of choice and anything outside the box is looked down upon. the tastier.. the better. And don't waste food.. wasting food brings superstitious comments about yourself..

Oh boy... well, my parents were both obese, and it was more important to them to have a bottle of coke and a bag of cookies to eat while they were watching tv in the evening than to make sure there was food for lunch for my sister and I.

I was mocked constantly for being "too thin", but then yelled at if I wanted a second helping of supper.

We never drank anything except coke or frozen juice (peach punch usually, that was my father's favorite). Breakfast was sugary cereal or eggos (but instant oatmeal was "junk", not worth eating), nobody bothered making supper most nights so in our teens, my sister who worked at a pizza parlour brought pizza home from work (when she got off at 11pm) for us to eat most nights.

I had, and continue to have, a very unhealthy relationship with food. I've spent years learning what healthy food looks and tastes like, and learning to enjoy vegetables. And even after all this time, I have a massive sugar addiction, and fall back into mindless grazing on junk food every time I'm the slightest bit stressed.

My mother's sister would hide food from me knowing it would be hours late into the night before my mom could pick me up after getting off work. She was also physically and emotionally abusive so my gran had to keep "contraband" that I could eat under her bed. As a result I would sneak food into my pockets whenever possible and eat it while hiding beneath my gran's bed.

My mom is extremely controlling. She would over feed me for my age and would "skinny" shame me (honestly I wasn't skinny, I just want obese which is what she wanted me to look like). My weight spiraled uncontrollably as a result from my childhood until my mod-20s.

To this day, I cannot eat a meal without breaking out a sweat that I'm doing it wrong. Like I'm by no means a model thin woman, I'm average for my weight/age/height but it doesn't help that this society is so flippin' obsessed with producing ever thinner women so.... any friends of mine who are gorgeous women in their own right but who happen to be even slightly heavier than I am will make unhelpful comments about how I can just eat "anything" and not get fat (untrue) or how nice it must be to be "soooooo" small (yes, I wear S up top because I'm flat chested but I'm also L on the bottom because I have a butt and hips)... but the thing is I'm not any of those things and it triggers my food PTSD to eat with people like them. When I explain why they make me uncomfortable, they just laugh it off or roll their eyes. Maybe one day I'll have a normal reaction to food and not have a mini panick attack while ordering or eating, but that day is not this day.

My dad was and is a very fast and very selfish eater. We’d sit down to dinner, and by the time I finished, my dad had eaten his firsts, seconds, and sometimes thirds, and there was nothing left for us to have seconds if we liked it. If there was a dish I liked, I had to get an extra large portion at the beginning, because there would be no more left for me. If I didn’t finish what was on my plate, dad made me feel guilty about wasting food.

When I was about 7 years old my grandma wouldn’t let me leave the table until I ate all of my hamburger. All my siblings were out playing in the pool and I couldn’t go out because I really really didn’t want to eat it. It’s been 13 years and I still haven’t eaten a hamburger to this day. Can’t stand them.

My parents grew up broke so I had to clear my plate or feel massive guilt. We hardly ate out so once I could eat out I spent all my money on it and now I feel almost addicted to eating out and binge eating.

Her dad would pick stuff off her plate as she was eating, so she tends to eat very fast and all of the food even if it's too much. She's made some progress on the eating more than she actually wants part, but still eats incredibly fast. Like, is through her meal before I'm even half done.

My mum would constantly be doing some new diet programme and loose a few stone, then eat a bag of sweets, essentially fall off the wagon, gain all the weight back and start all over again. She’s still doing to same.

I didn’t notice until my boyfriend pointed it out, but I’ve ended up in a similar pattern!

I had an eating disorder as a teenager and was underweight (unrelated to my mums dieting, there were other factors at play). The first time I tried to recover, I ended up over weight. Then I relapsed and was underweight again. Then I finally got it together and found a healthy weight I was comfortable at. I set myself a boundary of “this is the highest weight I’m comfortable at” and “this is the lowest weight I’m comfortable at”. It’s about a half a stone difference. But I hit the top weight about every year and a half, lose weight and go back down to the lowest. And so on and so forth.

I've always had issues, not so much caused by family, but here is something that didn't help.

A few years ago at Christmas, we took a family photo. Afterwards, Grandpa pulls me aside, shows me the photo, and points to my hips. He said "they look like a bag of potatoes." I still obsess over it. I am constantly at war with myself over it. Almost every morning I'll say to myself something like "No food til x time" or "Only one meal today", and most of the time I eat more than that. And then in turn feel like a failure with no self control. It's a cycle.

We weren’t allowed to leave food on our plate. I had to eat stuff that I didn’t like. There was an “A” menu and that was it. I find the grandkids get an “A” and a “B” menu. Apparently as grand parents they’re more concerned that the child eats versus what they ate.

Now, I fix a small plate and go back for seconds if I’m still hungry. You’ll rarely catch me eating leftovers and I don’t eat anything I don’t like. I’m adventurous and will try different foods, but I’m not swallowing it unless I like it.

My mum grew up with very strict parents, burned into her that thin is the only acceptable weight. She of course has had this same logic with me my entire life, even when I was very young if my tummy ever looked round - I was told it looked bad. However she always ate her feelings and this is the relationship I too have with my food. Upset or hurt? Eat something sweet or salty, any emotion that isn't stable - eat till the feeling goes away. I grew up skinny and was complimented and also bullied at the same time. So being at both ends of the spectrum has fucked me up. I'm now about 65kg - 70kg (5'5 and 28 yrs old) and this is apparently obese to my mum. Any chance she can get I'm told how things look bad on me and that I'm fat. I have days where I'm healthy with food, but as soon as I get an urge or trigger I binge. It honestly really upsets me.

My parents fucked up on a number of levels. My mom put chocolate syrup in my cough medicine to convince me to take it because I was always so hyped up on sugar that if I saw that it was chocolate syrup then hey down the hatch. My dad took me to the store with him every time he went to get cigarettes, and he always got me a pack of candy. So while he was furthering his addiction he was also pushing one on me. He probably just saw it as time for us to spend together which is cool, but damn I wish I had been forced to eat more vegetables as a kid.

I don't remember my family ever talking about healthy eating. Growing up in the midwest dinner was always casserole or something fried or fast food. So much cream and fat. In fact, I was told I needed to drink two glasses of milk every day for strong bones.

the night binging. watched my mother do that. good healthy like behaviour during the day then at night binging. same my dad too, he'd get drunk and night binge.

​

they also made me clear my plate until one time i was heaving and then they felt bad and just made sure i ate enough

​

also i really didn't like carbs much as a kid - i wanted protein and veggies but they were more 'fancy' than the rice so my mum would get mad at me probably because she was afraid i would get 'fur coat, no knickers' syndrome and make me finish all the cheap carbs before eating protein and veggies.... then later on be like 'why you so chubby? why you still so chubby?'

My mom was overweight, and she encouraged me to diet with her starting at about 12 years old. We did Atkins, South Beach, cabbage soup, Weight Watchers, etc. I would always lose weight fast, my mom would lose slower, so she'd give up and go back to buying McDonald's four times a week. I'd gain back whatever I'd lost plus more.

Through these "diet plans," I went from a healthy weight to over 200 pounds by the time I was 17. My mother constantly made comments about my stretch marks, my clothes, how I "needed to do some crunches." By then, I had a terrible relationship with food and weight, and I was clinically depressed.

I started starving myself, and dropped almost 60 pounds in three months. I got nothing but positive feedback from my family, who encouraged me to lose at least a pound per day, and cheered me on when I ate nothing but a nonfat yogurt, 2 rice cakes, and an apple all day for weeks on end.

Eventually I started eating again, and gained all the weight back plus more. Rinse and repeat until I was 320 pounds at 27.

Up until the age of 8, my grandmother would often watch my sister and me in the afternoons. She would use food as both a reward and punishment but would frequently turn right around and comment on how I needed to lose weight (I was a little chubby but not overweight by any means).

She was constantly giving us food--both healthy food and junk--and forcing us to eat it. Even if we had just had a full meal an hour before, she would not accept "I'm not hungry". To this day, there are certain things that make me nauseous to taste or smell for this reason.

My sister was naturally very thin, so grandma would give her a dollar for every pound she gained and would promise me a reward if I lost weight. On the rare occasion I weighed in and had lost, it either wasn't enough weight or she would reward me with more junk food.

Keep in mind that this woman was a lunatic for various other reasons on top of this. She taught me to always be ashamed of myself. For my weight, my intelligence, the fact I wasn't born blonde like my sister. I would never be good enough for anything or anyone no matter what. My family cut her off when I was 8, but she left a lasting scar on my self esteem and relationship with food.

Through my adolescence and early 20s, I used food for comfort. It became a reward system, a coping mechanism, and overeating as a way to make myself feel like shit if I wanted to punish myself. I dealt with anorexia at 13, and when I was put on antidepressants the following year for other mental health issues, I blew up. By the time I graduated high school I was morbidly obese and could barely partake in PE due to extreme hip pain.

I'm now 30, and have dropped over 125lb. My body fat percentage is at the high end of ideal for my age and gender. I'm still working to shed the last few pounds, I still struggle with food, but on top of completely rebuilding my lifestyle habits and relationship with food, I've improved and grown in a lot of other areas of my life as well. As much as it would surprise my 17 y/o self, I'm now a weight lifter, personal trainer, and HIIT coach.

One day at a normal doc check-up, my mom nonchalantly told me I was fat. I was a little pudgy, but not overweight, just inactive and I was a freshman in high school, never participated in sports. My dad would yell at me to get off the computer because sitting there would make me fat even though I was running cross country at the time. Both parents were or became obese. I'm overweight now, but fearing every little thing on the ingredient list messed me up for awhile.

When I was about 8, my mother, who struggled with her weight, told me everything would be great for me if I never got above a size 5. Struggled with my weight since I was about 13.

I finally told her about it in my 30s...she was mortified and felt awful.

That was also in the early 80s. I was told to clean my plate. My dad remembered going hungry as a very young child during WW2. And news of famine in Africa meant I should be lucky to have food and should eat it.

My mom used food as a comfort and a reward. Even now, when I go to my parents’ house to visit or we all meet at the beach for vacation, I get that excited feeling I used to get as a kid when we would plan to go out to eat somewhere good. Food is an obsession for me- I never stop thinking about it. I’ve gained control over my binging episodes with fasting, but I realize that I will always have to be aware of what I’m eating and will have to consciously make good choices and count calories if I want to keep my food consumption in check. I let loose for two years, and I gained 90 pounds. Lost 50 so far, so at least I’m going in the right direction again. I love food, but I also hate it.

My mom is a shit cook and was a single parent so lots of processed/take out stuff. Honestly though I found that pretty easy to unlearn as I enjoyed cooking and had basic skills by high school.

Bigger issue was my dad's family's fucking obsession with weight. "Queenfool, do you really need that dessert?" etc was pretty common. I was a chubby kid and as a (healthy) adult I am easily 50+ lbs heavier than any of the women in that family. I am 24 and just within the last year getting past giving a fuuuuck.

My grandma always told me how she weighs herself everyday. She always scolded herself if she had gained weight and everytime we went out to eat, she would tell everyone that this would be her lunch and dinner and she eats lots of sweets. My mum had her phases with counting calories, eating "healthy" and just always ate way too little but put a lot more on my plate. She's in her late 50s and wearing xs. My father always used to hide chocolate wrappers when he had eaten stuff. I in turn always hated the weighing and not eating because of stress so I overeat and turn to sweets for comfort

My grandma struggled with her weight her whole life, from being overweight to being a healthy weight. My grandma was very strict with what and when she ate until the day she died. My mom picked up on these restrictive eating habits.

Because of how she was raised my mom has always been very conscious of her weight and figure. As a result of that she has always had a bad relationship with food. When she is heavier than she would like to be she will eat as little as possible and say that she needs to starve herself for a week.

Growing up my mom was extremely vocal about any ounce of weight I gained and how my figure was less than perfect. I find myself unintentionally restricting what I eat if I feel heavier than normal. I also look at food and mental try to figure out how many calories are in a meal. My grandma and mom would tell me the calories in all of my meals starting at a young age. It’s easy for me to become obsessed with calorie counting and weighing myself daily if I’m not being mindful.

Making fun of fat people and thin people simultaneously. Constantly telling me to eat more but always remarking when I gained weight. Telling me that certain foods would aren't my body positively or negatively making me more aware of those body parts and therefore afraid to have whatever food regardless of it's affects.

Not nearly as abusive as some have undergone but it was still incredibly isolating and painful. My siblings have since been compared to me which has given them some issues and caused issues between us.

I think my mom struggled with disordered eating. She was always on a diet, and then binged at parties and buffet restaurants, etc. And it was not the worst, since we ate pretty healthy and treats were allowed from time to time, but I do remember there was this constant juggling with binging on food and restricting.

She also tells frequently about her youth when she did dancing seven days a week and could eat anything but still remain underweight (as if that was a good thing).

My mom, her sister and mother all talk about their weights, diets and all that jazz when we gather together for Christmas.

It's awful, I think my disordered eating took a spark from all this and I'm super worried my cousins absorb this negative body talk and develop problems later on.

I don't know if they fucked it up, but for us food was a source of entertainment. In some ways, this is great. I'm an adventurous eater and always want to try new things. I appreciate food and flavors and I'm an excellent cook. But it's taken me some time to learn that not every meal has to be some amazing culinary experience. Sometimes it's just nourishment for my body and that's totally fine.

I remember my mother was being on a diet or planning to be on a diet or booking an appointment that probably has something to do with a diet. She'd always constantly reminisce about the olden days, starting when I was very young - things like ''When I got married I weighed 47 kg'' if I weighed, say, 50 kg.

I also suspect she may have had bulimia at some point (she definitely had some form of disordered eating) because I clearly remember her throwing up after every meal. I was talking with my brother about it the other day and I'm surprised he never noticed.

When I jumped from 50 to 57 kg in a few months she immediately booked me an appointment and I got put on a bunch of meds. I didn't think much of it at the time but now I do see how bizarre it is to think it's okay for a young adult to be taking stuff meant for morbidly obese people (it's off the market now, actually).

My dad wasn’t home much when I was really young, and my mom is obese. She would have me sit with her and munch on junk food. I’d have McDonald’s nightly.

When the tables turned, my dad cooked nightly, chicken and broccoli usually. I lost some weight, and looked healthy.

Now, I do a mixture of both. Typically more junk than healthy, and I’m considered obese for my height and age, but struggle to lose weight due to medical issues.

I wish my mother never exposed me to junk food. I have terrible body image issues now because of it. It’s hurt my sexual life significantly (even though my boyfriend doesn’t care about my weight at all). I struggle to finding clothes that fit properly. It’s quite an issue, but there’s not a ton I can do. I can’t walk long distances, I’m not home enough to cook nor do I have the money to buy my own food to do such with, and I hate it.

I was told I had cellulite since I can remember so I’ve always been overly conscious of my legs. I stayed around 100 lbs until a few years ago (now 26F), metabolism changed and I gained about 50 lbs, and now I actually do have cellulite and tummy rolls. I used to love when I was sick and vomiting bc you could see my ribs and my stomach was so concave. Now I know how messed up that was.

My husband thinks I’m the most attractive thing on the planet but I see myself as a whale. Now he has to work exponentially harder to make me feel beautiful (although he does a wonderful job). I’m down to 135 and think I would feel more like myself at 120. I just really like food, guys.

Like a lot of comments here, my parents made me clear my plate. It’s actually lead to some pretty severe anxiety about eating. For a long time I couldn’t eat breakfast, physically could not eat a single bite of food at restaurants, could not eat in front of new people and I felt sick to the point of almost throwing up whenever I had to go somewhere where I would have to eat outside my own home. Doing better now, but it comes back every once and a while.

I was always terrified of getting fat, because my dad would always make horrible comments about fat women he would see out in public - always “jokes” of course, but it stuck with me. I thought being fat was the absolute worst thing a woman could be.

At the same time, my parents didn’t and still don’t have any idea about healthy eating. They both had pretty active jobs and my brothers were both sporty, so they could eat a ton of high calorie food and not gain weight. I was half a foot shorter than everyone else, nowhere near as active, and I genuinely had no real understanding of why I began gaining weight when I was a teenager. I hated my body and hated the genuinely concerned but still hurtful comments my dad would make about my weight. I hated food, but it was also a comfort. I’d eat kraft macaroni and cheese like 3 times a week cause fuck it, everyone else does, why shouldn’t I? Then I would torment myself for eating like a pig. Repeat at every meal time from age 13 to about 22.

It wasn’t until I moved out and began cooking for myself and doing research about calorie counting and weight loss and stuff that I really realized how much I was overeating as a teenager. Now I have a super healthy diet but I still have my occasional indulgences - but really I think my eating is more disordered now than ever. I can’t eat anything without worrying about the calorie count. And I still can’t make my family understand that I can’t drink coke three times a day or eat chips with every meal or get takeaway when I don’t feel like cooking without gaining weight. I do look better thinner and I hate myself less but I’ve kind of just replaced negativity about being fat with obsession with not ever gaining a single gram. Kind of a lose lose situation really.

I had to eat slowly as a kid because I had digestive issues. My father would eat the food on my plate to the point where I would have gotten maybe 3 bites in and he would have eaten the rest of my food. I was starving all the time and my doctor wondered why I wasn't recovering.
I'm still rather thin but I'm very food aggressive, if someone touches my food I get uncontrollably upset.

My parents always criticized (and still do) how much food I take- that my plate is too full or I got seconds or I ordered a dessert I didn't need or I had too many carbs/junk and so on. The worst is the comments about my weight (of which I am a perfect weight, I just gotta a little pudge on my stomach) and how it must all be from how much I am eating.

It made/makes me self conscious to order and eat with them- especially my dad- but I practice self-compassion and acceptance and know I am at the "right" weight and eat the "right" things especially as I deal with a chronic illness

Growing up I was constantly told I was fat and gross, yet the same people (dad, grandparents, aunts & uncles) would push food onto me. It was a very strange and confusing cycle. Once I lost 63lbs in high school, I was treated by those same people as if I was Miss America. For obvious reasons, I’ve had many years of weight/eating/self image issues. I’m probably the most comfortable in my skin than ever now at age 48 even though I’m a little chubby. Now my main concern is health not what a bunch of assholes think of me.

Had to clean everything off my plate. Couldn't waste anything at all. My mother (who is morbidly obese) has no idea of what is or isn't considered healthy. Started my relationship with yoyo dieting around 15 or so. Started at become self conscious about eating in public around like 11. To this day, I still refuse to eat around other people.

The kicker here is that each and every time I got into a new diet I had no support from her unless I was successful in some way. She would sometimes lie and say that she's gonna join me, but never pulled through. All the while, she would drop little hints about me needing to lose weight, which absolutely shredded my self esteem.

My parents basically just fed us nutritionless food all the time. Fast food, burgers, hot dogs. We VERY rarely had vegetables or fruit in the house. Bananas, maybe canned corn or potatoes as a side. I was 10 or 11 before I saw a bell pepper.

I admit it's hard to shake the foods I grew up with, especially sweets. My mom was only happy when she had junk food, which relieved household tension - she was a narcissist who was otherwise angry or depressed. So, food became our only happiness. I would often eat whether I was sad, stressed, angry, whatever.

I had periods where I would only eat a few hundred calories a day, then work out for two or three hours. Because I was fat, this was praised and encouraged, even when I started to feel cold and exhausted. I was 13.

As I got into my teenage years, I started binging. I would eat to the point of sickness. I once ate so much that I threw up in a restaurant... It was just compulsive. I remember my mom screaming at me for hours after that one, about how embarrassed she was of me and what a shame I was, and how could I embarrass her like that, etc.

a normal parent would have stopped and asked why their kid was using food that way. A normal parent would have gotten help.

I started binging again after my mom died and I got stuck as a caregiver for my dad. I gained 50 pounds over the course of a year. I truly feel that if I had been raised in a healthy environment, I would not have used food that way.

I am trying to do better because I'm trying to live a longer life for my children. I also just want them to have a happier, healthier life than I had. We very rarely keep packaged snacks in the house. they eat a balanced diet and I try to offer plenty of activity so that they don't just resort to boredom eating. They get a lot of movement.

I cannot imagine treating my children the way that I was treated, or that many of the commenters here have been treated in regards to food. I was also ashamed about my weight by my mother.

I'll never forget going to a pediatrician when I was 14, and I had gained about 20 pounds in a few months. The pediatrician got on to me about it. She started questioning my mom, who immediately offloaded the blame with "OMG she begs for snacks, what am I supposed to do?" while the pediatrician stared at her.

Horrible parenting, especially in regard to food.

I do think some kids are just built heavier, and some are just built lighter, but within reason. they shouldn't be having enormous weight fluctuations when they're not going through a growth spurt. if you offer healthy foods, encourage other means of dealing with emotions, and offer plenty of physical activity, usually weight will work itself out.

We just always seemed to eat our food too fast in our house. I grew up in a big family (numerically and weight wise) and I could never save food for myself. If I had a food I really liked I better eat as much as I can now because it won’t be there when I want it.

Also my mother would hate any talk of dieting and said all I needed to do was “lose 20 lbs at most”. Lost 55 lbs currently, I was quite obese and now I’m finally a healthy weight.

I still have more to lose but I can’t help but wonder if my inclination to eat all my food really quickly and never portion myself was because of the household I grew up in.

All they talked about was how skinny I was, I heard about it for my whole life so the day I started gaining weight (it was just growing from puberty, and I was still very small) I became so scared of not being skinny because they’d made me think that was all that mattered that I ended up with a mild eating disorder and to this day eating is like a chore to me, I only do it because I have to.

I grew up with a narcissistic mom so at good times I’d be loved on, called beautiful. But when I showed any sort of self love she’d call me vein and remind me where I got my looks and body from. And when she got bad, she got bad. And would tell me how fat and ugly I was inside and out. I rarely ate when I lived at home because of this or would secretly eat while maintaining 600 cal a day. Now I have binge eating disorder so dunno if they correlate but I’ve always had a bad relationship w food.

Both my parents have made nasty comments about my weight, even though I’m only 30 lbs overweight. My mother eats carrots boiled in water...literally no sauce, no flavor, no main course. Boiled. Carrots. She criticizes me whenever I eat anything any sort of sauce, flavor, etc., and for the grand finale? When my best friend’s brother died of cancer, what did she say? She said it was because he “eats crappy food” and literally because “his mom stuffed all those kids full of food”. He literally had a normal diet, he didn’t eat junk food every meal, just normal food with evil horrible sauce. What a gem.

From about 8yo onwards, depending on if she was drunk or sober (she's an alcoholic so more often than not it was the drunk variation), my mum would either call me fat, ugly and disgusting (drunk), or tell me she'd help me lose weight and buy various diet things for me (sober). I binge ate constantly up until I was about 14, when I moved in with my dad. Ended up developing anorexia which recurred on/ off for ten years. Had therapy a couple years ago to deal with some of the emotions and am slowlyyyyy getting over it, although I worry I will never have a healthy relationship with my body as a result. Parents (can) suck

My parents were always on a diet or eating like shit. Never in the middle. My dad swears by Atkins diet but is still fat. My mom is always fit and works out a lot but she’s never happy with her body and is constantly “dieting” even though she looks great. I feel like that is why I am never happy with my body and I still suffer from binging. I have adapted my diet to be able to sustain a healthy diet overall rather than “dieting” all the time.

My mom never aknowleged the fact that I ddn't like some foods, and chalked it up to me being picky. I'll be fair, I was a picky child, but there were only ever two things she made that made me gag to the point I thought I would throw up. Beans and peas. She made them constantly, and told me I'd 'like them when I was older'. I always tried to eat them, but I'd always feel the rest of my dinner coming up after them. I don't hate peas as much as I used to, but I'll never eat them willingly. Beans can die in a hole. My mom still shrugs off the fact that she force fed me these things, and refused to let me leave the table until I had eaten them. I wish I had the words to articulate why I didn't like them when I was young because now the feelings I try to bring up to my mom she says it's 'in the past, so I shouldn't be upset by it.' I have problems accepting things now, she made me feel like I wasn't liking something on purpose, so I constantly retry food that makes me sick, because I wonder if I was just being stupid about it before. It makes me second guess my feelings in a lot of my life.

In a strange way, the compliments my mother gave me as a small child (younger than 10) negatively influenced my relationship with food. She was a bit overweight, not obese, and had cellulite, stretch marks and all the normal things that come with being a woman who’s given birth.

She would say “you’re so beautiful, you’re so skinny”, tell me how lucky I was to have such beautiful skinny legs. How she missed when she was young and beautiful and skinny like me. Or “you can have some cake, but I’m not having any because I’m so fat already”.

Instead of making me feel better about myself, it made me feel worse. I thought my mother was the most beautiful, wonderful person in the world so if she was ugly, what was I? It also made me worry that becoming fat was an unavoidable curse, which led to a lot of crash dieting, excessive exercise and restrictive/disordered eating in my teens. I love her and I truly think she always wanted to make me feel beautiful and confident but the way she went about it was fucked up and didn’t work at all

My father would point out (in my opinion) very skinny celebrities and say they were overweight. He always called me the "chunky one" of my siblings (although I was of average weight and my siblings were underweight) and asked repeatedly if I made "good food choices" at the end of every day. He treated them to junk food and had me watch them while they ate. He withheld groceries and told my siblings it was because I was overweight and as soon as I became a reasonable weight, we could all eat normally again, subsequently making them resent me. He stood me in front of a mirror once and had me point out what I hated about myself most. He told me I could change them if I ate less. These were things like my violin hips and broad shoulders, genetic and impossible to starve away. My weight is the first thing he mentions when he sees me, even still. He compliments me only when I am sick and deep into my disorder.

My mother was obsessed with fitness and had an eating disorder I hadn't made sense of until I was knee-deep into mine and made the connection. She exercised obsessively every single day and (my parents were divorced by this time) soon began dating the owner of a local gym who was on steroids heavily. She bought us junk food all the time and showed no interest in making sure we knew about nutrition or balance in that regard. She restricted massively and usually drank her meals (extreme alcoholic). She was very obsessive about her appearance. She got a pretty extreme boob job and had her eyeliner tattooed onto her when I was about 10, spent hours getting ready for even just a trip to the grocery store, and sought male attention however she could. Although I have nothing against this, it made an impression on me at a young age.

Between the two of them, there was no consistency and I just ended up hating myself. I was not taught self-love--only how to improve. Now I bounce between extreme restriction and recovery and have never been content with my body. I don't see food as it is, only as calories. Guilt washes over me if I indulge. My days are planned around what I will consume and how to get rid of it.

My mom has always had a very unhealthy obsession with her weight. She is very healthy now but used to be 300lbs in highschool.
When I was a child I noticed my mom saying things like "I'm so fat" or complaining about her size. She was always complaining about what she ate and how much.
Needless to say, I picked up on it quickly. I put myself on a diet when I was in like grade 6. I lost a lot of weight in grade 8. And I've had a very unhealthy relationship with food since. I wish I could see photos of myself when I was in highschool, I only ever took pictures waist up, I was probably pretty thin. But my body image is so horrid I can't look at myself in the mirror. I'm a size 4 and I feel like a little hippo

My mum would say yes to anything I asked for, so naturally young me is going to ask for McDonald’s, fizzy drinks, lollies/chocolate, and I would get it every time. She also has a very small stomach due to a gastro bypass surgery. Whenever we go out for meals she can’t finish her meal so she encourages me too finish it for her. Now I have a big issue with portion control and self control when it comes to the kind of food I’m eating.

Also my dad is the complete opposite, eats very little and very healthy.

Not nearly as severe as other people on here, but I was a picky kid, so whenever I didn't like something my father would say "you'll eat it or you'll get nothing" so I used to pretty much starve on days where something got cooked that I didn't like, which caused me to binge on whatever got cooked that I did like, still working on eating regular portions today at 22.

My mom would eat in secret, weight about 400lbs and claimed she never ate/ ate a slice of toast a day. She told everyone this. I never saw her eat, and if she was forced to, she'd pretend she couldnt eat it all. She said it was genetic and she would never lose weight. So i grew up thinking I could eat whatever I liked because Id grow up obese anyway.

Of course I grew up obese. Thankfully when I began studied nursing I grew some logic and lost the weight and became fit. My mom is still in denial. She even got weight loss surgery but Ive seen those McDonalds wrappers hidden.

My mom was in a bit more quiet role when I was growing up. My father was also a chronic gambler - so when he was out and had to bring me along and I got bored - he would give me money to go buy a snack or if I sat quiet long enough we would go somewhere eventually when he was finished and we were able to go home. Eventually I got into a relationship where food was also a reward. The problem is - I like food. I like trying new things... but eventually it just got too much. One time after I finished my exams for the year my ex bought me some flowers and a whole cake. He ended up eating most of it but it just felt like the cycle continued. If I was having a bad day or anything he would get me a 'little treat' or if I had a long day I wouldn't have to cook because he would just pick something up. I am slowly changing some of my thinking but so many years of this is hard to counteract.

I always got the "there are children starving in Africa" lecture if I didn't want to finish my dinner. Because if this, it has taught me to finish everything that is on my plate despite being full. Also my mom was a typical Southern mom who would load my plate up with more food than a child could consume. We ate pretty healthy, always had veggies, my mom rarely let me have sugary, processed snacks or sofa, but there was always just so much food.

My dad was also pretty bad about complaining about wasted money if food went bad or uneaten. He also was the one that taught me that the faster I ate, the faster I could go play or do what I wanted after dinner.

Now, as an adult, I struggle with overeating and eating way too fast. I have weight problems because of this. I love my family and I know they just wanted to make sure I was fed, but it did cause me to have a very bad relationship with food.

I know it’s not right now, as an adult, to eat larger portions when I’m feeling hungry and I do try to control what I eat as much as possible but the shaming for how I felt and the hiding of food in the house, as a child, had a lasting effect on me.

When I was able to start living alone there was a lot of binge eating not because of hunger but simply because for the first time I had a sense of freedom to make my own decisions.

Growing up, my mother would talk to me about my younger sister's weight gain. It made me feel conscious of my own weight. If I feel like I'm gaining weight, I'll get anxious and start cutting back on food.

My mom thinks potatoes are a suitable helping of vegetables for meals. Other veggies were boiled or roasted. I never knew how good seared/steamed veggies were until I started going to better restaurants and finally learned to cook them myself.

Also for my youth I only got iceberg lettuce based salads at holiday meals. I hate iceberg lettuce. Give me some of that kale/sliced Brussel sprouts/romaine/etc if you want me to be interested. I'll add those suckers to bulk out any meal now.

Growing up they always had me finish my plate, even if I said I was clearly full. As a tween/teenager I would smoke a lot of weed to prevent from getting hungry. I'm one of the lucky few that dont get the munchies, just get horrible cotton mouth. Late teens, early adulthood when I started eating normal again the habit came back & I gained a lot of weight. I broke this habit just last year?

Without meat a meal is not a meal. Meaning anything with veggies alone were considered a snack or not a full meal. I'm still struggling with this one

Having fast food a lot. Growing up my grandparents bought us fast food a lot too so I do love me some fast food 🤢 for the most part I'm good with this one too.

I grew up with food insecurity. Why? Because my parents, raised in the Great Depression, also grew up with food insecurity.

These "lessons" about food and poverty can be generational. So often parents unconsciously teach what they were taught as children, unless they seek new knowledge, or somehow find that new knowledge in society.

I have slowly worked my way out of this kind of thinking, but it took a lot of self-help and therapy.

It also helped A LOT to become mostly Vegan. That has leveled off my blood sugar better than any other way of eating, and with level blood sugar, I don't binge eat for emotions nearly as much I did when I was younger.

You know, food cravings are not always about psychology. Sometimes they're from eating the wrong diet overall. It's been proven in studies, for example, that sugary and fatty processed foods only make people hungrier. They do not satiate the way unprocessed and healthy fats can.

Not even sure where to start. First I was made to "clean my plate," then rewarded with food and treats, then told, at 6 years old, that people would stop making fun of me if I lost weight (the only people who made fun of me were my family), then berated for having eating disorders, etc. etc.

My dad physically doesn’t feel hunger. When my brothers & I would go on trips with him, we would only eat once a day. He only eats once a day. Now, I feel like I have an obsession with food that many others don’t.

I developed a nasty habit of overeating because we’d always be served large portions and were encouraged to finish everything.

It got worse when I had the freedom to make my own food choices because my mom would only ever let me eat “healthy” foods. Gained a shit ton of weight and was the reason I turned to bariatric surgery because nothing else helped my food addiction.

Been told I am fat since as young as I can remember. Family, teachers, random people would make comments about my weight. Controlling what and how much I eat. Making me weigh myself daily and making me reflect on what
I ate the day before if my weight didn't decrease. Constantly talking about how everything has 'too many calories' and just overall freaking out whenever I eat something that's 'bad'.

It really impacted my relationship with food, from using food as a coping mechanism, starvation, binge eating in private, yoyo dieting.

My mom always complained about how fat she was (she’s probably an average sized woman). Older sister gained some weight in high school (super skinny to normal) and always complained about how fat she was too. I was terrified of a slowing metabolism and weight gain from getting older. My mom also didn’t really cook, we were on our own for most meals, which made it really easy not to eat without anyone noticing. I got super skinny and very anemic and had some other health scares, so started eating a bunch more. Now it’s like constant cycles of hunger and binging and I can’t seem to break it.

I still call myself fat in my head if I’m ever over 110lbs (at 5’4”). Though I also hate how I look when I get any skinnier, bc I end up looking like a child. It sucks to only occasionally not hate my body.

One time, I did a blind taste test for a school science project. My parents were behind it, really. I sat in a chair and they had me smell then taste stuff on a spoon.

My relationship with food was really fucked over after they put liquid vanilla on that spoon. Smells great but tastes awful. I canceled the taste test and cried in my room.

Also, my mom once tried to get me to eat shrimp. I tried it and hated it, but she said that I couldn’t have ice cream if I didn’t eat the bowl. I sat there for five minutes crying at it before I left. Haven’t touched seafood at all since.

I now have problems with texture and trusting food I don’t know. Mixing foods was also a problem too, but luckily I’ve been able to start eating burgers and sauces and things mixed up like curry.

I will always remember the day I came home from school and really wanted cheetos, so I grabbed a bowl and poured some in. My mom walked in the kitchen, saw it, and made a comment about how I shouldn't be eating that and how I should wait for dinner.

​

I was a chubby kid, I already was feeling fat in like 4th grade. This comment hurt so badly. There was ALWAYS junk food at home, but if I ate it there were comments made. So my logical response? HIDE ALL THE FOOD. BINGE IN PRIVATE. I'm 28 now and still struggle with binge eating. I still hide food and eat in private. I'm working on it, but gosh I wish it never happened

When I would speak to my mother, she would always make comments about how much I was eating, the type of food I was eating, when I was eating and how much weight I’ve gained. One day I asked her straight up why she felt the need to express those comments to me, her response was “A woman should always maintain her appearance”. I could only imagine where she learned that from.

I could write a book on this... still unlearning all of this and it’s challenging.

My mom is a narcissist and always felt not thin enough. She pushed her negative ways of thinking about food on me and my sister at an extremely early age. It’s sick and sad in my opinion,
I realized when I got older that it wasn’t normal.

We weren’t encouraged to openly eat when we were hungry, if we opened the fridge, we were yelled at.
We were criticized if we wanted more food
We often felt hungry growing up, food was not a pleasure to eat, we felt shameful for eating.
If our mom thought the food was too unhealthy she would yell at us, but if she wanted to eat something “unhealthy” it was ok.
If we went to a restaurant, it was stressful for me.
Like I had and still have fear, shame and stress about eating out, I was criticized for what I wanted to order and then was expected to share my food.

I have anxiety about going to restaurants because they were always such a stressful experience for me. It makes me feel weird in social situations with food.

I always feel judged. Every single time I eat.
I have to talk to myself and tell myself it’s ok to eat and enjoy food.

Man, this sounds awful.

Sometimes when I get back into negative thought patterns, I have to tell myself, that this is fucking ridiculous and it helps. It’s a healing process for me.

My parents introduced sugar freely into my diet. It messed up my teeth and I find it hard to get away from it as an adult. On my husband's side, his parents are the children of WWII survivors. They endured famine, rationing, work camps, and the bulldozing of their family homes for the Atlantic Wall. The war left a traumatic impact on their relationship with food. My husband's family has had weight issues ever since the war. The combination of needing to finish their plate and interruption in traditional diet negatively impacted them.

starting when I was around 9 or 10 whenever I would ask for candy or junk food when we were at the store my dad would call me a pig and say I had no self-control. I had a huge appetite as a kid but I never gained weight, and he always had something to say about the amount of food I was eating (honestly he still makes comments without fail when I visit). once when we were eating dinner he told me to “stop shoveling food in my mouth” because I was cutting a piece of meat while chewing a bite of food. if I wanted a cookie after dinner it was always “are you sure you should be having that?” just weirdly aggressive, judgmental comments like that that made me associate food with feeling shame, even though I was voraciously hungry all the time.

it turned out I had an untreated autoimmune disorder (Graves disease) that sped up my metabolism to the point that I was eating probably between 2500-3000 calories per day and rapidly losing weight. once I got treatment and gained a little weight (I went from 100 lb to 130 at 5’6”) I was horrified because it felt like he had been right all along and I was disgusting. I struggled with restricting food for a few years after I moved out but thankfully never a full-fledged eating disorder. I’m mostly in a healthy place now, but I have to be careful with counting calories to avoid the temptation to cut as much as possible.

HA I could write a novel on this. Growing up having your size 2 mom talk about how fat she is and commenting on every single weight gain or weight loss of everyone around us. Telling me that I don’t know how to control myself around food and don’t understand what full is, so she had to police my food for me. Having my dad say “well at least you’re still a confident person even though you’ve gained so much weight” at thanksgiving dinner. Not letting any sweet food in the home at all and the subsequent binging at friends houses in my childhood. My sister telling me when she owned her own fashion line, I could be the plus size model. I could really go on but I already had my therapy session today, so ima stop. Let’s just say that 30 years in, and I’ve got a lot of disordered eating to unpack.

my mum ignored me when i said I didn't want more food and expected me to eat more, telling me I was at the right weight when I wasn't. Only as I grew up I saw that it wasn't normal to eat junk food every day, and that I can't eat like my brother if I wanna lose weight.

I was a bit of a pudgy child so when I was 10 my mom had me start counting calories and actively try to lose weight. Additionally we had the clean your plate policy where you couldn't leave the dinner table until you cleared your plate. So I'd over eat bc I had to clear my plate then feel disgusted by how much I ate. I never really lost much weight though, later found out I have hypothyroidism and I don't know how much that affected my weight growing up but ever since I've been on medication for it I've been much lighter and have realized I don't eat enough food and should be eating more than I have basically my entire life.

It's not all my mom's fault though she was screwed over mentally by her mother in a similar fashion and I've yelled at her before for trying to eat too little.